A Blind Eye by G. M. Ford

an inner compartment, he found his cell phone. Instinctively, he checked the room before using his thumb to dial the number.
    He was prepared for the unusual number of brittle clicks and electronic exchanges before a human voice split the static. “This is not a secured connection.”
    “I know,” he said.
    “No further messages will be accepted from this number.”
    “I know.”
    “The sending unit must be decommissioned.”
    “Yes. I know.”
    “Please enter your access code.”
    He did so. “Again,” said the voice. He complied. Three clicks and a new voice. Female this time. “This is an unsecured connection.”
    “I know.”
    “No new business can be conducted on an unsecured connection.”
    “It’s old business,” Corso said.
    He heard the clicking of a keyboard. “Abrams, Arnold Jay. Any and all on a locate.” More clicking. “Nothing.”
    “Ten months and he has yet to generate a single scrap of paperwork?” Corso said.
    “Yes, sir,” she replied. “As that is your only current account, this communication is now—”
    “Hey hey hey,” Corso chanted into the mouthpiece.
    “—terminated.”
    He expected to hear a dial tone. When he heard only silence, he went on. “I know it’s outside the protocol,” he began, “but I’ve got a problem.” From the other end, nothing but silence. “Sissy Warwick. She’d be somewhere in her middle forties about now. Lived in Avalon, Wisconsin, from nineteen seventy-three to nineteen eighty-seven. That’s the last record anybody has of her.”
    “This is an unsecured connection. I’ll have to consult with my superior. Would you care to wait?”
    “No,” he said. “I’ve got to go.”
    Click.
    Corso walked into the bathroom, set the cell phone on the toilet lid, and used both hands to remove the white porcelain top to the tank. Old-fashioned ball-and-lever. The inside of the tank stained brown by the minerals in the water. He rested the top in the sink and then picked up his phone. Pushed two buttons. The light came on. He dropped the phone into the tank and watched as it waffled its way to the bottom. Watched until the light went out, then replaced the top and headed for the door.

10
    T welve twenty-one. Corso stood in the window and watched as the gray cloud of exhaust enveloped the back half of the Ford Expedition. The windows were blurred by beads of condensation, making Dougherty nothing more than a rumor of movement in the car’s interior. A flash in his peripheral vision drew his eyes to the left. Two blocks down, Duckett and Caruth were crossing the street, on their way back to the hospital from lunch. Corso smiled. Trask had been right. Although they wore their matching stocking caps pulled down over their ears, each man also carried his cowboy hat. Just in case. You never knew.
    Corso smiled as he counted in his head. Gave it another minute and a half and then headed for the door. Down the long hall, a pair of white-clad nurses stood together in the silver glare of the nurses’ station. One gestured with an aluminum clipboard. Pulled a pen from her pocket and wrote something on it. The other nurse seemed to agree. He waited some more.
    Twelve twenty-three. The nurses parted company, one disappearing behind the desk, the other squeaking her way down the hall and into a room. Time to go.
    Corso’s cowboy boots clicked against the worn linoleum as he hurried toward the stairs. The stairwell smelled of disinfectant, acrid and twitchy to the nose. He stretched his long legs and began to take the stairs two at a time. Down one flight to the landing, using his free hand on the metal handrail to propel himself around the corner and down.
    He was halfway to the ground when he heard it. Whistling and the chick-chick of feet on the stairs. He skidded to a halt. Stood still. Swallowed his breath and listened. No doubt about it. Somebody coming up the stairs at a trot. Whistling what? He listened again. The tune was disjointed and ragged, but